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Mazda Celebrates 25 Years Of The MX-5 Miata: Video

On February 9, 1989, the world was introduced to the very first generation of Mazda’s MX-5 Miata convertible sports car at the Chicago Auto Show. That first MX-5, the NA, then went on to win rave reviews from many of the top magazines and would eventually spawn two successors. Now, a fourth generation of the iconic sports car, the ND, is in the works, and while it would have been great to see it launched for the MX-5’s 25th anniversary this past weekend, we’ll have to make do with a special website launched by Mazda that charts the car’s history.

The site features a special message of thanks for the team at Mazda and a rundown of every MX-5 model launched between 1989 right up to 2012. Interestingly, there’s also a tab marked “Coming Soon” though it’s not clickable just yet.

Mazda says the website will be updated over the course of the year, so perhaps we’ll soon have some of the first official details on Mazda’s fourth-generation MX-5. We’ve already spotted a test mule for the new car and expect it to be launched on the market towards the end of the year.

The new MX-5 is a very important model, not only for Mazda but also for Fiat Chrysler since it forms the basis of a new sports car for the Italian-American automaker’s struggling Alfa Romeo brand. It will also have some very big shoes to fill considering the MX-5 Miata has been the best-selling two-seater sports car in the world for the past several years, managing to rack up 920,000 sales as of December 2013.

The MX-5's success is that it hasn’t strayed from its promise to deliver pure driving enjoyment at an attainable price. Launched in May 1989 with a starting price of $13,800, the first-generation MX-5 featured a 1.6-liter four-cylinder engine with 116 horsepower and 100 pound-feet of torque. The second-generation MX-5, the NB, debuted in 1998, offering a more powerful 1.8-liter four-cylinder engine with 140 hp and 119 lb-ft of torque.

In 2005, the third generation MX-5, the NC, was introduced with a new 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine, producing 170 horsepower and 140 lb-ft of torque. We eagerly await the launch of the fourth-gen ND model.